The present invention concerns the problem of improving reliability of radio navigation and guidance systems, particularly ground-augmented or differential global positioning systems.
A global positioning system (GPS) measures the three-dimensional, global position of a radio receiver, using the distances between the radio receiver and a number of earth-orbiting satellite transmitters. The receiver, usually mounted to a vehicle such as a commercial passenger aircraft, receives signals from the satellite transmitters. Each signal indicates both the position of its transmitter and its transmission time, enabling the receiver, equipped with its own clock, to approximate signal transit times and to estimate the distances to the transmitters. A processor coupled to the receiver uses at least four of these distances, known as pseudoranges, to approximate or estimate the position of the receiver and the associated vehicle. The accuracy of these estimates, or position solutions, depends on a number of factors, for example, changing atmospheric conditions and performance of individual satellite transmitters.
In commercial aircraft navigation and guidance, global positioning systems (GPSs) have traditionally been used only for determining position of an aircraft during non-critical portions of a flight, that is, between takeoff and landing. However, in recent years, researchers have started extending GPSs for use during landings.
These extended systems have taken the form of ground-augmented or differential global positioning systems which typically include two to four ground-based GPS receivers and a ground-based differential correction processor (DCP) and a correction-data transmitter, all located around an aircraft landing area. (These systems are sometimes called GPS-based Local-Area-Augmentation Systems, or GPS-based LAASs.) The ground-based GPS receivers, each with a known position, work as normal GPS receivers in determining respective sets of pseudoranges based on signals from at least four earth-orbiting satellite transmitters. These pseudoranges are fed to the ground-based DCP, which uses them and the known positions of the ground receivers to determine correction data. The correction-data transmitter then transmits to aircraft approaching the landing area. These approaching aircraft use the correction data to correct position estimates of on-board GPS receivers, providing better position solutions than possible using their on-board GPS receivers alone.
These corrected position solutions are then compared to a reference landing path to determine course deviations necessary to ensure the aircraft follows the reference landing path. The course deviations are input to an autopilot system which guides the aircraft during automatic landings. For the autopilot system to function within safety limits set by the Federal Aviation Administration, the position estimates are required to stay within minimum accuracy limits known as vertical and horizontal alert limits. Failure to stay within accuracy limits causes issuance of an alert, signaling a pilot to abort the automatic landing and to restart the landing process.
Unfortunately, conventional methods of determining the accuracy of the corrected position estimates lack the ability to cope with loss of satellite signal receptions or correction data stemming from ionospheric effects, unintentional jamming, satellite failures, or fading of correction-data transmissions. As a result, systems using these methods are prone to more aborted landing attempts than acceptable.
Accordingly, there is a need for better ways of determining accuracy in ground-augmented or differential global positioning systems.
To address this and other needs, the inventor devised a ground-augmented (or differential) navigation and guidance system that incorporates a unique method for determining the accuracy of its position solution. In a first exemplary embodiment, the system includes a receiver for receiving signals from several satellite transmitters and a processor for determining a main position solution and one or more position subsolutions. The main position solution incorporates a set of pseudoranges corrected using all available correction data from a ground transmitter, and each subsolution based on a subset of the available correction data. Differences or separations between the main position solution and the subsolution are then used to determine accuracy or protection limits for the main position solution.
In a second exemplary embodiment, the navigation system further includes inertial sensors, for example, accelerometers and gyroscopes, for providing vehicle motion data to the processor. The processor uses Kalman filters to determine the main position solution, subsolutions, protection limits, and course deviations from the motion data as well as past and present values of the satellite and/or correction-data signals.
Adding motion data further improves reliability, because the processor can compute protection limits during brief periods when there is insufficient data for computing the position solution. In a sense, the Kalman filters and the motion data enable the processor to build up xe2x80x9cmomentumxe2x80x9d for coasting through periods of lost GPS or differential correction information.